Ayres, Duncan share creepy experience at haunted Bay Area hotel

Haunted hotels aren’t exactly uncommon on the NBA circuit. The Skirvin Hilton in Oklahoma City is particularly infamous, with Eddy Curry, Jared Jeffries and ESPN’s Bill Simmons all alleging brushes with the ghost of the maid who is said to have jumped to her death from the 10th floor while holding her baby.

In Berkeley, Calif., the Claremont Resort is supposedly haunted by multiple spirits, including one of a 6-year-old girl who apparently died in the hotel. Among the inexplicable accounts from guests who have stayed at the hotel are this blog post from a photographer named Kathy Davenport:

Eerily quiet at that end of the hallway where our room was located. Room was cozy enough with a view. But something just didn’t feel right. Did not sleep well at all. Neither did my daughter. (I usually don’t have any problem sleeping in hotels.) We kept hearing noises from the people in the room above and next door, and doors slamming shut. Moved to another floor, and we immediately felt better. There was just something really unsettling about the 4th floor.

None of the spirits here are reported as being harmful, just playful. The maids and other guests have reported lights flickering, televisions going on while you’re in the shower, and drawers opening by themselves. Nevertheless, there’s a distinctly eerie feeling when you go to the 4th floor. We didn’t even know any of the stories when we got here, yet we could feel something strange as soon as we stepped off the elevator. I just attributed it to being an old hotel.

As luck would have it, the Spurs stayed at the Claremont during their recent trip to play Golden State. We’ll let Jeff Ayres and Tim Duncan take it from there…

Ayres: “You get in at whatever time. I took my room key. I could hear stuff in the hallway, like people in their rooms. So I’m thinking people are watching TV or whatever. So I get to my door, and my key doesn’t work, but it sounds like there’s somebody in my room. Like I hear a little baby, not crying but making noise. I’m like, ‘What the heck?’ I keep trying my key and it doesn’t work. So I go downstairs to get a new key, and I tell them (somebody’s in the room).

“So they call the room, and nobody answers. They’re like, ‘We can get you a new key and send you up with security and make sure nobody’s there, because there shouldn’t be anybody in there.’ Then they’re like, ‘We’ll just get you a new room.’ It was the creepiest thing. I heard a couple of other guys heard babies in the hallway, kids running down the hallway. Creepy. I really heard voices and a baby in the room, and there wasn’t anybody in there. It was crazy.”

Duncan: “I heard a baby in his room. There was somebody or something in his room, yeah. I definitely heard something. It wasn’t creepy, because I assumed it was really somebody in the room, and they gave him the wrong room. But when they told me the story the next day about calling up there and no one in the room, it’s at that point you get chills. I totally agreed with him. There was a baby there, absolutely. I heard about the history of the place, and I’d rather not (stay there again).”

update, 5 p.m. Tuesday: Former Cowboy/local radio personality Dat Nguyen said a former teammate of his had the same experience at the same hotel.

@Monroe_SA@danmccarneysaen We stayed there once when we played the Raiders. If I recalled correctly James McKnight heard baby noises then.